Supreme Court Rejects Last Voter Complaint (6)

Published: 21.03.2011 17:01

Photo: Scanpix

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The Supreme Court's Constitutional Review Chamber ruled on March 21 that the petition by student Paavo Pihelgas to invalidate the electronic voting results in the March 6 parliamentary elections lacks substance.

Pihelgas sought nullification of the election result on the grounds that the software used in the electronic voting was flawed and could make it possible for a virus to block a vote without the voter knowing that any interference had occurred. To prove his case, Pihelgas conducted a series of experiments with the participation of several voters who had been informed by him of the nature of the test and had given express consent to participate.

According to the law, the Supreme Court can nullify election results in case a violation of voter rights has been established that had or may have had a significant effect on the election outcome. Therefore the Chamber set out to determine whether a violation of Pihelgas's rights had occurred.

Based on the fact that Pihelgas participated in the test willfully, the Supreme Court did not find that his voter's rights were infringed upon, insofar as he knowingly put himself into the situation where his vote didn't reach the electoral committee's web server.

The Constitutional Review Chamber also noted that since only an established violation can serve as a basis for nullification of the election result, a hypothetical possibility that someone's computer may have been infected with a similar type of virus without that voter's knowledge cannot serve as sufficient cause for nullification.

 

Erkki Sivonen

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Comments (6)

  • knut albers

    21.03.2011 17:11

    "Based on the fact that Pihelgas participated in the test willfully, the Supreme Court did not find that his voter's rights were infringed upon, insofar as he knowingly put himself into the situation where his vote didn't reach the electoral committee's web server." Not that I expected some other result, but stated above basically means that all prove of evidence is deficient as any demonstration at the court can be done intentionally only. This is quite a weak reasoning and give reason to worry and indicates that the Supreme Court seems to be dysunctional. To villify an implementation of evidence is something new to me, at least. But you canot not make a democracy without a functioning Supreme Court. Their task is to preserve democracy, not undermine them. About implementation of an international arbitration you do not even need to further bother. Who would want to settle an agreement in such a country?

  • Clive

    21.03.2011 17:28

    Knut, do you actually believe the things you wrote here? If each hypothetical 'threat' to an election outcome would suffice to nullify an otherwise fair and transparent election outcome then not a single election would meet your criteria of fairness. Your leap suggesting that the SC's ruling undermines democracy is simply ludicrous. Be pragmatic, please...

  • Polar bear

    21.03.2011 20:20

    The supreme court is right, in order to invalidate an election, actual fraud or violation of voter rights has to be established. It doesn't mean that all proof is deficient, it means that you have to prove an actual case that *really happened*. Additionally you have to show that their was an effect on the election outcome. Neither parts were proven, hence the election cannot be invalidated. In theory there are numerous ways to cheat in elections, even without electronic voting, for instance ballot box stuffing, so if theory were enough all elections would have to be nullified.

  • knut albers

    22.03.2011 10:33

    As I stated earlier, I did not expect any other outcome, but the reasoning seems to me fairly questionable. There has been also other decisions made at Supreme Courts at other EU countries that did not require a prove of an actual case to give evidence of prove of unconstitutionality. Germany, for instance, declared the use of e-voting machines as illegitimate simply for the reason that voters could not control and count the votes cast and that this is contrary to the principle of public elections (reference file 2 BvC 3/07 and 2 BvC 4/07). Btw, this doesn't automatically mean that a nullification takes place. The Prosecutor gave the wrong reason for the right thing and the high court has made ​​no effort to take the time for a rational reasoning. You may expect from a Federal Supreme Court more than that. This is what I stated. This is what I am standing for.

  • Polar bear

    22.03.2011 11:49

    @knut, You don't understand how the legal system works. The question put to the supreme court was a request to nullify the election result. That's a pretty narrow and well defined request, that had to be dealt with quickly considering the importance. It was rejected. Period. If you want to have e-voting declared illegal, because you think it violates some laws, you are free to file a complaint, but that's an entirely different question.

  • knut albers

    22.03.2011 12:52

    Polar bear, just read what I stated: "I did not expect any other outcome, but the reasoning seems to me fairly questionable (...) The Prosecutor gave the wrong reason for the right thing and the high court has made ​​no effort to take the time for a rational reasoning." I am in no way talking about the nullification, but about the reasoning. Speaking about how the "legal system works", I am unable to file a complaint as I do not qualify to vote on national elections and hence it does not (directly) concerns me as I am not a constituent in this regard. That e-voting may be banned is not my personal opinion only, but the official opinion of courts and governmental bodies in numerous countries. I provided already examples for that, however, here is another verifying piece of information from the Ministry of the Interior in the Netherlands: "As long as there is no good alternative, Netherlands agrees with pencil and paper (...) Research shows that there can be no guarantee of voter privacy with new voting devices. Electronic voting would require the development of new equipment and a large investment, both in money and organization. The government considers that this offers little value compared with pencil and ballot votes."